by Diana Rivers
“You have my love, Tazzi. You will always have my love as long as we both shall live, that I can promise you, but not my passion. That part is over. It died under that heap of men who meant my death. I think that kind of innocent loving died in my heart that day when you rode off.”
“I did not ride off!” I shouted at her in desperation. “My mother hit the horse to make her run. She did it to save my life because I could not move to leave you. After that I wandered lost in the woods for days, lost even to myself. If Pell had not found me I might well have died. I thought I had seen you killed before my eyes, and I cared little for my own life after that. Oh, Kara, if I had known you still lived I would have tried to find my way back no matter what.”
“Just so, Tazzia, the Goddess did not mean for us to be together in that way. Even if you had come back I would already have been gone. You could not have tracked us. Wanderers are not easily found when they wish to hide.
“Listen to me Sister, Vestri is my Zenda. That is done. We have pledged to each other, and I honor that pledge. That one day changed everything. I am not who I was, the child you remember, and I doubt you are either. Your father saved my life, but not my spirit. I was like a shadow, a walking ghost and might have remained so all my life. It was Vestri who reached out to me and taught me to love again, struggling with patience and kindness to re-awaken my heart that I thought was dead. Now you tell me to shut my heart to her, to cast her off like a broken pot. I ask you, what kind of person would I be if I could do such a thing?”
“So you shut your heart to me instead,” I said bitterly. “And your precious Vestri hates me, that much is plain to see.”
“How could she love you when you glare at her as if you wish her dead? Come, Tazzia, by some miracle we have found each other again. Can we not be at peace? This small war between us is like a victory for the Zarn. Besides, you have other lovers, several I hear.”
“None of that matters now. I thought you were dead, gone out of my life forever. I had to find a way to ease the pain, to go on living. Now that you are here I would let that all go in an instant. Then we could be together again as we were meant to be. You are the only one that really matters to me. Oh, Kara, it will be like losing you all over again, like having you die again if I have to watch you hold another’s hand or look into her eyes as you used to look at me.”
She stepped back from me with a look of shock on her face. “Tazzi, what a terrible thing to say. Here I am, very much alive and asking for your friendship and your love, and you wish me dead if I cannot be as you want. No, you must take me as I am. Vestri is part of my life now. I cannot throw her away like a cracked vessel.” She reached out to put her arm around me, trying to draw me close. “Come, let us stop this quarreling and rejoice that we have finally found each other, alive and well.”
I pulled away from her. “Have you forgotten? Does it mean nothing to you now, all that we were to each other?” The pain swelling in my chest was such that I could hardly speak those words. I was ashamed to hear the beggar’s whine in my voice.
“Tazzia, Tazzia, do not try to cast a spell over it. We were little village children together, foolish and innocent. What did we know of life or the world? Our love was childhood fumbling ended at men’s hands even before the Zarn’s edict. Come now and sit beside me and tell me all that has happened since we parted.”
“You can read it if you are able to read,” I said with cutting bitterness. “I am writing it all down. Alyeeta has set me to that task.”
“Oh, I can read well enough. You know that Potters’ children are taught to read. But I would much rather hear you tell it. Oh, Tazzia, do not make me beg for your friendship.”
“Kara, Kara, you ask too much. I cannot sit here next to you, close and warm, wanting so much to touch you in that way. It tears at my heart. I cannot sit here telling stories.” I was ready to spring away.
“Please, Tazzia, please, do not take it so hard.” There were tears in her eyes. She put her hand on my arm as if to hold me there.
I groaned at her touch, “Oh, Kara, lover, sweet one.” On sudden impulse I leaned forward to kiss her, all my passion leaping up at that moment. With a quick motion she turned so that my lips found her cheek instead of her lips. Rebuffed, I straightened instantly and pulled free of her hand. “Kara, you are breaking my heart.” It was like a cry. The words burst out before I could stop them. Quickly I turned and walked as fast as I could up the knoll through tears that blurred the way.
***
Kara! Kara! Kara! I was filled with pain and longing for her. Even sleep did not bring relief, only troubling dreams. It hurt me so to be with her and yet not with her, to hear her laughter and see her loving glances turned elsewhere. I could almost wish her dead again. Then, at least, the loss would not always be with me and constantly before my eyes. When I said this to Alyeeta she gave me one of her long stares, saying at last, “Be careful what you say, girl. Sometimes the future shapes itself to our words.”
It should have shocked me that I could think such a thing, that I had fallen so low, was so full of rage and bitterness yet I could not change that, nor did I really try. Instead, I fed on it. Of all the things that had happened in those past months, losing Kara and regaining her only to lose her again was perhaps the last blow, the final push to make me lose what little balance I had left. The gentle loving child who had been my mother’s daughter, the child who had talked to birds and animals and had been the village healer was gone. The little Witch-child had grown up into some kind of monster.
Rage—I was being consumed by a terrible soul-tearing, teeth-gnashing, blind, bitter rage that wanted to scorch every living thing. I almost expected the flowers and green leaves to wither and blacken under my feet and the little birds to fall scorched and songless out of the sky. Nothing said or done around me gave me any joy or even any pleasure. Longing to hurt all within range of my voice, I picked quarrels over nothing with everyone who crossed my path. My hands would clench into fists, itching to strike out. From the hurt of it, Kara soon stopped trying to speak to me. After a while she avoided me altogether as Rishka did. As for Vestri, it was fortunate that violence could not pass between us for I surely would have caused some.
Pell tried to speak to me, as my captain and as my friend. Instead of heeding her words, it gave me a fierce ugly pleasure to see a look of fear cross her face at some of the things I said. Olna tried in her kind, loving way, but I had no ears for that sort of thing. Even Rishka tried, this new Rishka I hardly knew. I mocked her, calling her soft and girlish.
One morning Hamiuri herself blocked my way. As I tried to dodge past her, she grabbed my wrist. The power of her grip brought me to my knees. “Daughter, I see you running straight for the cliff’s edge as fast as you can go. Do not count on us to be able to stop you. You must do that for yourself.”
“I want nothing from you Witches!” I spat out savagely. She let me go, stepped back and made a sign with her fingers. That should have been enough to frighten me, but instead I scrambled to my feet and ran off heedlessly.
Even Telakeet tried to speak to me, gently and with none of her usual mockery. All to no use. I listened to no one, not even Hereschell, not even Lhiri when she came to me with tears in her eyes, saying, “Beware, Tazzi, remember what happened to us.” The thought of Lhiri and Nunyair with their burned hands magically spelled together, should have scared some sense into me, but I paid no heed. The monster that had been growing all that time had broken loose. I had been embittered by the terrible cruelty I had witnessed, and now I myself was cruel. A fury burned in me that only more fury could appease, a fastfire of the soul with nothing to put it out. It was madness. I was mad. There is no way around it and no other word for it.
I could sense Alyeeta watching me, but always from a distance, watching and waiting. Then, one morning, I woke to find her sitting next to me on my ledge, stroking my arm. When she saw I was awake, she leaned forward and said so softly it was almost a whisper, “Tazzi, a
ll of us live on the bosom of the Mother, but some of us live closer than others to Her great beating heart. Those are Her chosen ones, the ones to whom She gives Her gifts, with whom She shares Her powers. You, child, are one of those...”
I did not let her finish. I sat up, my mouth opened and a voice I did not know shouted, “A curse on the Mother and all Her gifts! I did not ask for them. I do not want them. Rishka was right, before Olna turned her into a soft spineless thing. She said all she wanted was a bloodied sword and a skilled arm to wield it, and I would say the same.”
There was a moment of shocked silence. Then Alyeeta’s fingers bit into my arm so deep that for many days after I wore a row of dark bruises to mark the place. “Say what you will to me,” she hissed low and fierce in my ear, “but when you curse the Mother you have gone too far. Blasphemy, Tazzia, that is blasphemy. You must leave this place or you will bring a curse down on all our heads.” I struggled in her grip. She released me suddenly, and stood up. Swinging her hand so that her pointing finger aimed straight at my heart, she said, “Go to the hills and seek out an asking place, to be cured there or to die. That is all that is possible now. You cannot go on living among us like a festering sore. There is nothing left for me to say to you.” With that she turned and walked away. At the sight of her retreating back a sudden rush of fear cut through my rage.
***
That evening, for the first in many days, I went to sit at one of the cook fires. Women quickly made space for me, more space than I needed, but there were no friendly smiles, no one would meet my eyes. Kara was telling a story, seemingly unaware of my presence, and Vestri, of course, was sitting beside her. I watched Kara as she spoke, thinking, Kara is mine, my lost love, my childhood sweetheart. We would be together even now if not for that woman.
When we had first found each other, I had thought all my searching, my pain, my emptiness was over. I was sure that the shattered pieces of my life would come together in her arms as if by magic. But it was plain to see she loved another. She would not throw her arms around me and make me well again, promising that we would always be together. This stranger, this intruder had come between us. How easily I forgot that already in Nemanthi things had been hard between us.
Suddenly her story was ended and she looked across the circle into my eyes. I got to my feet wanting to run off and hide, wishing I had stayed away. Before I could make my way out of the crowd she was standing in front of me. Taking my hand in a firm grip she said, “No, I will not let you run off with me calling and calling after you. This time we will talk. Not even your bitter words can drive me away.” With tears brimming in her eyes she stared straight into mine. For a moment my heart was touched and softened.
Then Vestri stepped up next to her and asked spitefully, “Do you always run away like that from what you do not wish to hear?”
There was a roaring in my head and blood seemed to fill my eyes so that I saw her mocking face through a haze of red. With no thought I threw myself at her, hands reaching for her throat. Such was the force of my attack that I was thrown down by it and found myself flat on my back with head ringing. I was in a dark place and barely conscious. “Help me,” I heard Pell say to someone. Then I was being carried, laid out on a bedroll, and covered up.
Chapter Twenty-Seven
I woke the next morning to the sound of bells being rung, or rather to the tolling of bells, a terrible doleful noise that scraped on my nerves and set my teeth on edge. Since my head still hurt from the night before, I tried my best to shut it out. All to no use. No matter how I wrapped my ears it still came through. It seemed to be rising from the very ground itself, coming up through my body to lodge in my bones. Since there was no more sleep to be had, I got up reluctantly and went to see who made that dreadful sound and to what purpose.
Others were moving in that direction also, Wanderers as well as Khal Hadera Lossien, though none crowded close. Looking between their backs I could see a circle of Witches, those I knew and some of the others as well. With Nhenoma leading, they were following each other round and round in slow, heavy steps, tolling black bells tied with strips of white cloth that fluttered in the breeze. I found the sound of those bells intolerable. The chant that went with it, all in words I could not understand, raised the hair on the back of my neck. I had only heard Witch bells rung in the joy or solemnity of ritual. This time they seemed to ring of death, over and over.
Suddenly I knew. A belling out! That was what they did. A belling out! I remembered Alyeeta telling me of the Witches once doing such a thing to a Witch named Morgea and that she had died of it rather than change her ways. It was what Witches did when one of their own profaned their practices and could not be persuaded to stop. I shivered and went to stand next to Pell.
“What Witch are they belling out?” I asked her in a whisper.
Startled, she turned and looked at me. A terrible pity came into her eyes. “No Witch,” she said, shaking her head.
“But...” Just then I heard my own name being sung in the chant, the words leaping out at me from all those meaningless sounds, striking terror into my heart. Now I knew. It was for me they tolled their black bells.
“Tazmirrel of Nemanthi,” they chanted three times, then turned and changed the direction of their circle. I saw Alyeeta among them tolling her bell along with the others. For just a moment I thought she saw me and caught my eye. I shivered again. It felt as if a cold blade pressed itself against my heart.
“Pell, will you let them do this?” I whispered to her in desperation. Now the terror was at my throat.
“Let them!?” she exclaimed. “Have I a choice, Tazzi? Have you left me any choice? I have tried everything I know. We all have. You listen to no one. Perhaps you will listen to this. Besides I have no power to stop this. Just as with Lhiri and Nunyair, it is out of my hands now.”
“It will likely mean my death, Pell, do you understand that?”
She shook her head. “Only if you cannot heal yourself or do not try. You had best forget all your great quarrels with the rest of us and look to your own healing, Tazzi. And you had best do it quickly.” She put her hands on my shoulders and turned me so she could look into my face. “Tell me the truth, Sister, if you were me what would you do with Tazzi?”
I looked down at my feet, unable to meet her eyes. The bells seemed to be beating in my blood, throbbing and reverberating in my head. “I would send her away,” I whispered hoarsely. At that moment I could not even feel angry. Put in those words it all seemed very simple.
“Then go make yourself ready. Take only what is necessary. The Witches will tell you where to go.” She released me and gave me a little push back in the direction of the ledges. Just at that moment all the Witches in unison turned and pointed toward the northern hills. Even with that the tolling of the bells did not cease for an instant.
Needing to be away from that sound, I turned and walked quickly back the way I had come. A path parted before me. None of the women would look me in the eye, not even Rishka or Lhiri or Maireth. Back at my ledges, I set to tying up my bedroll and began stuffing my pack with trail bread and a change of clothes. I worked in haste. No matter what else might happen, at that moment I wanted nothing more than to be gone from there and away from those bells.
At almost the same moment I became aware that the tolling had ceased and that Alyeeta was standing at my side. “You!” I hissed accusingly as I whirled to face her. “You were among them, tolling your bell along with the others. Alyeeta, how could you do this? I thought you loved me.”
“And so I do, Tazzi. You know I do. I love you more than my own life, whatever that may mean. But I do not love you more than what the Khal Hadera Lossien could become. That is too much to ask.”
Such was the tempest raging in me that I wanted to shout, Then what is your love worth? You do not love me much at all. Somehow I had sense enough to bite my tongue on it, though Alyeeta no doubt heard it from my head. Instead I stared at her with no love at all in my eyes
until she herself was forced to look away.
Gazing off at the northern hills she said in a cold, flat, distant voice, “I have come to tell you the way to the Asking Place, no more than that. That is all I am allowed to say. Go there. Be cured or die. That is the meaning of a belling out.” She had set her bell down on the rock, and I could see the strange markings cast in the metal. When the strip of white cloth rippled in the breeze a chill went up my spine.
“So you want me gone from here?” I said, still with some defiance in my voice and stance.
“There is no other way,” she answered in that same cold voice. “As it is, you are a danger to all of us and to yourself as well. We are sending you to an old Asharan place of healing. Seek out the cave, open your heart, and ask the Mother for healing. She is wiser than we are. We will wait seven sun-turns for you. If, before that, you return to us healed, we will all rejoice. If not, we will consider you dead to us and to the world as well.” After that she gave me some directions that I am not free to repeat here.
To my horror, even as I shouldered my pack, she picked up her bell and began to toll again. She might as well have driven me off with a whip. Almost at a run, I went toward the horses. Seeing me, the other Witches began tolling again. I saw Nhenoma point at me, and over the tolling I heard her shout, “Not the horse! Alone! Go to the Mother alone!” So I was not even to have Dancer with me for comfort and for company. So be it. What did I care anyhow?
It was my anger that carried me out of the camp and beyond, mindlessly keeping my feet moving down that long valley toward the northern hills. My head was filled with all my grievances toward others, Kara and Alyeeta especially for what I saw as their betrayals. As I went through the camp the way parted for me again, faces moved away from me and backs were turned. All eyes were averted. I might as well have been the walking dead. No one wished me farewell or good journey or safe return. Not one person, Khal Hadera Lossien or Wanderer either spoke a single word of love or luck, save for Murghanth who, out of the corner of her mouth, said in a hoarse whisper when I passed close to her, “May the Mother guard you, Tazzi.” All the others let me go in silence.
